Today, computer already becomes the standard equipment in office. Software vendors have found it increasingly important to improve user productivity by enhancing software usability. One important aspect of enhancing software usability is to give users more flexible customization options so that the application can be configured due to the user's specific needs.
In known art, a software application (such as an enterprise application) can be customized via a centralized customization user interface. FIG. 1 is an example of a centralized customization user interface. As shown, the user interface 100 includes customization tree containing a number of customization categories 101 and a number of customization entries 102. A customization category 101 can contain one or more other customization categories 101 and/or one or more customization entries 102. If a customization category is contained within another customization category, the contained customization category can also be called a subcategory. Each customization entry 102 is associated with a value range, within which a value can be specified to customize the behavior of the software application.
Thus, centralized customization user interface organizes all customization entries in one place. If a user has knowledge about the customization entry, the user can quickly locate the customization entry by navigating through the category and subcategories containing the customization entry. But it requires the user to have an overall understanding of the functionalities provided by the software application and their relationship with customization entries. It might take an inexperienced user a lot of time to explore the customization tree to find the right customization entry. For enterprise software applications such as enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM), customization options are even more complicated. Therefore, a technique to facilitate an inexperienced user to quickly locate customization options to customize a software application is desired.